Dec 06/Jan 07

Community-based businesses need to be just as productive as any others - a consideration that helped prompt Crestra, a home improvement specialist, to decide to equip its service vehicles with satellite-based tracking and navigation equipment. The company has chosen the Masternaut system.

Crestra is the trading arm of a charity called Groundwork Creswell, an organisation that works with the local community to deliver practical projects to improve the environment, create jobs and boost the economic wellbeing of the area.

Crestra's role is the delivery of environmental home improvements such as the installation of cavity wall and loft insulation in domestic properties.

Darren Pollard, Crestra's construction manager, says Masternaut has delivered a number of benefits. "Our crews can be tasked with up to eight installations per day and like many other service providers we offer our customers either a morning or afternoon slot, but we are unable to give precise timings.

"By using Masternaut we are able to monitor the exact location of each crew and therefore provide our clients with more detailed timings."

An addition benefit, he says, is that the system ensures the company knows that both drivers and our vehicles "are where they are meant to be at any given point in time."

Masternaut uses GPS to locate vehicles and GPRS to transmit positions for viewing on Microsoft MapPoint online street mapping. The positional information can be accessed in real time via any Web-enabled PC.